


Now That I'm Older

by plinys



Category: X-Men (Movies)
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-08-29
Updated: 2015-08-29
Packaged: 2018-04-15 12:49:32
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,151
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4607376
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/plinys/pseuds/plinys
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>When Scott begins to show symptoms of something all too familiar to Alex, he brings him to the only place he knows that can help, and runs into an old 'friend' along the way.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Now That I'm Older

**Author's Note:**

  * For [fleurting](https://archiveofourown.org/users/fleurting/gifts).



> I really wanted to write an interlude between Days of Future Past and Apocalypse, and this prompt offered me the opportunity to do so. I hope you enjoy it! :)

Going back to somewhere has never been easy.

Alex having spent so much of his life heading away from things knows that all too well. If he had had it his way, he would have stayed off in the middle of nowhere where nobody knew who or _what_ he was. That’s where he’d been ever since he made it back overseas, ever since Raven (or was it Mystique now) showed up and sent them back to safety.

Though things seldom worked out the pay he planned.

And when the burner phone he’d kept on him with only three people knowing the number lit up, he knew something had happened, even before Scott’s voice came over the line. ( _‘Something happened, it’s like with you before – but it wasn’t my fault, and oh god._ ’)

The franticness had died down somewhere between the phone call, and Alex shuffling his little brother into the backseat of his car. Now, as Alex looked in the mirror he was greeted with a look that was probably meant to give off _cool defiance_ , but was slightly obscured by the fact that Scott’s eyes were covered with a novelty eye mask that read ‘ _sweet dreams_ ’ in pink cursive font.

“Are we there yet?”

“Almost,” Alex answers. The drive has been wearing on both of them.

“This thing itches,” Scott says, not whining because he thinks he’s too _cool_ to whine, but it’s a near enough thing. “Can I take it off for a few minutes, I’ll keep my eyes shut.”

“This car’s a rental,” Alex reminds him, “I’m not having you blow a hole in my _rental_ car, I need that security deposit back.”

Scott groans. “Fuck you.”

Alex can’t help but wonder if he was _that_ much of an asshole at fifteen? A second glance in the mirror, gets him to reluctantly admit to himself that he probably was. Though he would have to ask the guards that the juvenile detention center he had been stuck in to be sure.

He doesn’t say anything else for a while, lets the kid stew in the silence, for the next fifteen miles, until Alex pulls up to somewhere that instantly feels welcoming and familiar. A part of him wonders if that’s part of Charles’s doing, some subliminal telepathic messaging making him want to go up to the gate of the familiar place.

The sign which had been knocked off last time he stopped by now sits proudly in its place on the bricks. The _Xavier Institute For Gifted Youngsters_. There hadn’t been such a fancy name back when he had trained here, but if luck was on his side there would still be people enough to help.

“Stay here, I need to get the gate,” Alex says, before stepping up out of the car and shoving the thankfully well-oiled gate aside.

When he gets back in the car, there’s no _‘are we there yet’_ greeting him, and for a second it seems as though the cool and collection look his little brother had been putting on has disappeared in place of the concern that Alex had heard on the phone.

“Are you sure they’ll be able to help?”

“They helped me,” Alex says, remembering all the sessions in Charles’s underground bunker while he learned to control his powers, and the hours sitting in Hank’s make shift laboratory as they worked to develop some way to control his powers. He had no doubt that they would be able to do the same with Scott.

By the time they’ve pulled up to the front there’s already somebody waiting at the door, almost as though they had been expected visitors. Hank looks much like Alex remembered him, bright blue, and still as beastly as all hell, but in a good way.

He smiles wide, a smile just for Alex, before turning to Scott and saying “Welcome to our school, the professor’s upstairs and would love to have a chat with you.”

“Yeah, okay,” Scott replies, shrugging a bit, he’s _cool kid_ attitude back full force.

His tone, earns Alex a raised eyebrow from Hank, before they’re both shuffled inside. Alex off to the kitchens for a cup of coffee that he apparently looks like he needs (Hank’s words not his), and Scott up to meet Charles.

It’s not long after Alex has made up his drink, and added the appropriate amounts of sugar and cream, that Hank joins him in the kitchen. They both seem to stare at each other warily for a moment, before Hank speaks up.

“He reminds me of you.”

Alex scoffs. He’s heard that one before, but never in anything close to an approving tone. “Pretty sure that’s not a compliment.”

“It could be,” Hank tells him, “If it means he might end up like you are now.”

That there is almost a compliment, but Alex tries not to dwell on what all of that means. Turning his eyes away from Hank’s imploring gaze.

“Why do I have a feeling you’re not planning on sticking around,” Hank asks, after a moment’s pause.

“Because I’m not,” Alex tells him plainly, “You’ll look after Scott, right? Make sure he learns to control it.”

“That’s my job,” Hank reminds me.

“You know what I mean.”

“What do you want me to say, that I’ll look after your little brother so you can disappear back to who knows where?”

Alex grimaces. That’s hardly playing fair. “Ideally, yes.”

Hanks brings his hand up to rub at his face. He looks tired, more so than Alex ever remembered him looking before. But after a moment, he slowly nods his head. “Of course, I will.”

“Thank you,” Alex replies. A small bit of relief seeming to leave his chest all at once.

He sets the unfinished coffee mug down on the table, grabbing his keys up from where he had set them.

“Leaving already?”

“It’s for the best.”

“You’ve said that before,” Hank reminds him. And Alex knows he has, the words are familiar on his tongue, they were the same ones he said right before he enlisted in the war. The same one he said after stopping back in the aftermath of Washington DC.

“I’ll come back,” Alex says, knowing those words won’t make any difference either.

For a second there’s a feeling of Hank’s hand on his arm, stopping him from leaving. “You’ve said that before too.”

“Well, I kept my word in the end, didn’t I?”

Hank let’s go of his arm at that, slowly, and for a second Alex wants to lean back into the touch wants to convince himself that staying for a few hours or a few days won’t be so bad. But he doesn’t instead, he takes one step further out of the door.

He’s nearly gone when he hears Hank call out at him.

“You’re a bit of an asshole you know that.”

“It’s part of my charm.”

 


End file.
